This application makes reference to and claims all benefits accruing under 35 U.S.C. Section 119 from an application entitled xe2x80x9cOPTO-ELECTRICAL CROSS CONNECT DEVICE OF HIGH DENSITY,xe2x80x9d filed in the Korean Industrial Property Office on Aug. 5, 2000, and assigned Serial No.2000-45478.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to optical communication systems, and, in particular, to an optical cross-connect system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an optical communication system, an optical cross-connect device is typically provided at an intermediate node connecting the upper node, such as a central base station, and the lower node, such as a subscriber. The optical cross-connect devices can be used in a wide variety of physical circuit topologies to improve the performance of existing networks or to create a new network. In particular, the optical cross-connect device can be used to transmit and allocate channel signals, optimize traffic flows, and control the congestion and growth of an optical network.
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram illustrating a conventional opto-electrical cross-connect device. As shown in FIG. 1, the conventional cross-connect device includes an Nxc3x97N electric cross-connect switch 120 at its center portion for rearranging the routing for the Nxc3x97N optical signals, a switch board 110 with a plurality of 2N radio frequency connectors 130 along its four side ends, and 2N optical transceivers 140 connected to the respective radio frequency connectors 130 of the switch board 110 via the 2N signal cables 150. In the event that the value, xe2x80x9cNxe2x80x9d, representing the number of subsystems increases, the corresponding number of the signal cables also increases. Thus, it becomes cumbersome to perform the interconnections of the 2N signal cables 150 to the growing number of systems and subsystems. In addition, the size of the switch board 110 increases to accommodate more of the 2N radio frequency connectors 130 at its side ends.
Therefore, there is a need for a novel packaging system that minimizes the size of the overall layout and maximizes the workable volume of the package.
The present invention is directed to an optical cross-connect device, which can improve spatial efficiency without requiring the interconnection of signal cables.
According to an aspect of the invention, there is an optical cross-connect device that can improve the integration of the optical transceivers coupled thereto.
To achieve the above objects, there is provided an opto-electrical cross connect device of high density, including: a shelf with a plurality of guide rails at its inner portions; a switch motherboard disposed on the rear surface of the shelf; an electric crosspoint switch positioned on the front surface of the switch motherboard; a plurality of switch connectors positioned on the front surface of the switch motherboard; an optical transceiver board mounted in the guide rail of the shelf; and a transceiver connector disposed at the rear end of the optical transceiver board, for connecting to the switch connector of the switch motherboard.
The foregoing and other features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following, more detailed description of preferred embodiments as illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which reference characters refer to the same parts throughout the various views. The drawings are not necessarily to scale; the emphasis instead is placed upon illustrating the principles of the invention.